Microglia reveal sex-specific brain recovery mechanism after ketamine anesthesia

MedicalXpress | Jul 31, 2026

During ketamine anesthesia, the brain's nerve cells fall silent—as consciousness returns, they begin to reconnect. For the first time, researchers at the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA) have shown that immune cells in the brain play a critical role in this process—with differences between female and male brains. The findings were published in Science Advances.